Yoo torture controversy ensnares state lawyer

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File - In this June 26, 2008 file photo John Yoo, a law professor at the University of California at Berkeley, testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington. Justice Department officials have stopped short of recommending criminal charges against Bush administration lawyers who wrote secret memos approving harsh interrogation techniques of terror suspects. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File) less

File - In this June 26, 2008 file photo John Yoo, a law professor at the University of California at Berkeley, testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington. Justice Department officials have stopped short of ... more

Photo: Susan Walsh, AP

Photo: Susan Walsh, AP

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File - In this June 26, 2008 file photo John Yoo, a law professor at the University of California at Berkeley, testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington. Justice Department officials have stopped short of recommending criminal charges against Bush administration lawyers who wrote secret memos approving harsh interrogation techniques of terror suspects. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File) less

File - In this June 26, 2008 file photo John Yoo, a law professor at the University of California at Berkeley, testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington. Justice Department officials have stopped short of ... more

Photo: Susan Walsh, AP

Yoo torture controversy ensnares state lawyer

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Critics of John Yoo, the author of the Bush administration's so-called torture memos, want a lawyer in state Attorney General Jerry Brown's office to drop his plans to teach a constitutional law class with the UC Berkeley professor next semester.

"By instructing a class with Mr. Yoo, you are helping to legitimize his illegal and unethical actions," organizations led by the National Lawyers Guild said Tuesday in an open letter to Deputy Attorney General David Carrillo, a doctoral candidate and instructor at the university'sBoalt Hall law school.

They asked Carrillo either to teach the course by himself, if the school will allow it, or to leave it to Yoo. Signers included the law school's chapter of La Raza Law Students Association and the Boalt Alliance to Abolish Torture.

Carrillo did not return phone calls about the letter. Brown's office issued a statement Wednesday saying Carrillo was teaching on his own time as part of his study for an advanced legal degree.

"Mr. Carrillo's activities at Berkeley Law are unrelated to his work at the (state) Department of Justice, and we are told that they have nothing whatsoever to do with torture memos that John Yoo may have authored," Brown's office said.

Yoo was a U.S. Justice Department lawyer from 2001 to 2003 and wrote a series of memos on interrogation, detention and presidential powers.

The best known was a 2002 document that said rough treatment of captives amounted to torture only if it caused as much pain as "organ failure, impairment of bodily function or even death." The memo also said the president may have the power to authorize torture of enemy combatants.

The Bush administration withdrew the memo after it came to light. Jay Bybee, who signed the memo as head of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel, is now a federal appeals court judge in San Francisco and a target of frequent protests at his courtroom appearances, including one Wednesday.

The National Lawyers Guild and other leftist groups have urged disciplinary action against Yoo and other former Bush administration lawyers who approved painful interrogation methods. They have filed complaints with bar associations in Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C., where Yoo is licensed.

Opponents have also demanded that UC Berkeley fire Yoo, who began teaching at the law school in 1993.

The school's dean, Christopher Edley - a former presidential campaign adviser to Barack Obama - has said he welcomes debate on the issue but believes a tenured professor like Yoo is protected by academic freedom unless he is convicted of a crime. Edley also says he is awaiting a long-delayed Justice Department report on its internal investigation of Yoo.

Carrillo and Yoo are scheduled to start teaching a course on "Constitutional Design and the California Constitution" on Jan. 11. Law school spokeswoman Susan Gluss said the class is limited to 24 students, and 23 have already signed up.